The story relayed by both is that of a lonely young boy, Oskar in the original and Owen in this remake, and his encounter with an ages-old but eternally pubescent vampire girl, Eli in the original and Abby here. The boy’s parents are embroiled in a bitter divorce, he has no friends to speak of, and he gets bullied at school. The girl has an aged and troubled father figure who she relies on for the harvesting of blood. She seems to move from place to place as often as the authorities’ attention to serial murder would require. Here we get an early scene that sets the tone of the film and introduces a lot of the themes that the filmmakers are working with. Alone in his room, Owen watches the other inhabitants of his apartment complex through a telescope. When Abby and her caretaker move in, he sees it from his frosted over bedroom window. When they go down the hall to their unit he follows to watch them from the peephole in his front door. He lives his life hidden, spying, alone. The people of these films have secrets, lives hidden behind closed doors. Over the course of the film the two characters form a friendship that works as a respite from the mounting tensions that surround them. Owen has to deal with the increasing violence of his encounters with the school bullies. His father’s absenteeism and his mother’s alcoholism offer him little help. Nor does the seeming disinterest of the teachers at school. With Abby he finds someone willing to actually listen to his problems and offer some helpful advice. Abby is dealing with increasing attention from the police as her caretaker becomes more and more careless with the murders necessary for her continued existence. What she gets from Owen isn’t as clear, but their meeting and developing of a relationship is presented with an innocence and tenderness that is irresistibly charming. The heart of this story is two lost, desperate souls reaching out for companionship and comfort. The fact that Abby probably doesn’t have a soul needn’t be dwelt upon. The tension slowly ramps up throughout. The bullying gets more and more dangerous while the killings become more and more brutal. By the time Owen learns what Abby is, he is so desperate to have somebody on his side that there isn’t much question as to whether or not he will accept her for who and what she is. The question that adds the real intrigue to the film is what his choice will cost him.
The main thing that Let the Right One In had going for it were its visuals and mood. The sparse, desolate, snow and ice covered Swedish landscape lent a lot of character and atmosphere to the film. The apartment complex is in the arrangement of a quad, the walls plain brick and the grounds frozen and empty. The indoor pool where much of the boy character’s daytime activities take place is all cold tile and exposed showers. The only warmth in this film is in human contact. The only safety in being hidden away behind walls; where the vampire girl avoids the sun and the boy his attackers. The killings are memorable and visually affecting. An attack in a dark tunnel, shown in silhouette, and a burning in a hospital bed were such striking images that the advertising for the film focused on them heavily to sell the experience. All of this is replicated in Let Me In. The Swedish setting is replaced with the snow-covered part of New Mexico. It’s doesn’t quite have the same alien effect as the setting of the first, but it’s done up to be as close as possible, and it’s more than enough icy isolation to properly convey the themes and mood of the story. The killings are all here, and while a little more graphically violent, they recreate the awe and terror of the ones in the first film just fine. There is a car wreck in this US film that was shot very inventively. A stationary camera faces forward in the back seat as the car flips and rolls, being torn apart around it. It was a unique, inventive use of perspective that felt like a carnival ride and showed me that great care was taken in how everything was blocked and shot. Visually and in terms of atmosphere, Let Me In does everything possible to live up to the lofty standards of the original film.
The one aspect of Let the Right One In that I didn’t think this remake had any chance of replicating was the acting. The casting of the original film was pitch perfect, and every performance was affecting and just felt right. To my surprise, I didn’t miss any of the original actors here a bit. Chloe Moretz, who was the only thing I liked about Kick-Ass, turned in another great performance here as Abby. She is a versatile young actress and I’m sure this won’t be the last film I see her in by a long shot. Kodi Smit-McPhee, who annoyed me in The Road, is used much better here as the put upon Owen. He is certainly able to emote anguish, and if he develops further with age and keeps choosing roles as wisely as this, he could very well have a lengthy career ahead of him. The kids are supported by a couple of engaging character actors in Richard Jenkins’ performance as the father and Elias Koteas as a local policeman investigating the murders Jenkins’ character has committed. Both not only match the actors of the original film, but also make the roles their own. Their performances both feel authentic and despite the fact that neither gets much screen time, they both get a couple of moments to shine, and they do the most with what they are given.
So, the mood, the visuals, the acting, they are all handled well in both films, and I’m going to call it a wash as to which movie does things better. But aside from this, there are a few plusses and minuses inherent in both interpretations of the material. Let the Right One In had a subtle, beautiful score that fit the material perfectly and added to the ethereal feeling of the unique Swedish setting. The music in Let Me In just doesn’t come close to comparing. In the beginning of the film it is far too ominous, foreboding, and horror movie clichéd. Then later on, when the two main characters begin to grow close to one another, it turns into a series of sweeping, romantic themes. This isn’t a straight horror movie, and this isn’t a love story. What we’re presented with is far more subtle and subversive than that, and the music in this update doesn’t do the material justice. And the New Mexico setting, while serviceable, just cannot recreate the charm and uniqueness of the original. What you get is a remake that is less of an experience than the film it is recreating. On the other hand, Let Me In sacrifices several characters that appear in the original, and becomes a much more focused, swiftly moving film because of it. Also, it doesn’t delve into any of the gender confusion issues that were in the original. Material that I felt was unneeded, muddied an already complex and layered story, and didn’t get enough focus to wind up being important anyways. The result is a film that is better paced and better structured than the original. Let Me In didn’t include a scene from the original that came off as absurd and derailed the tone of the film due to some awful looking computer generated cats, but it did have a couple moments of bad CG during its vampire attacks that looked just as low rent and ridiculous as the cats in the original, so we’ll call it even between the two in that respect. And in my opinion, taking everything into account, the two films are pretty even in execution overall.
So back to that question of necessity: did Let the Right One In need to be remade? Is it right that it was remade? Let Me In didn’t improve on the original, so I can’t argue for its existence on that account. But, it didn’t come out worse than the original either, so I also can’t dismiss it outright. When looking at these two films as stand alone works I like them both equally. And that’s really the only thing that should be considered when rating a film. How well does it succeed as a film when all the pre-conceived baggage that you bring into the theater is thrown out? So I give this film the same four-star rating that I give the original. And still, while I was watching it I couldn’t help but get a bit bogged down with a been-there done-that feeling. I couldn’t help but be a little bored with this movie, simply because I watched it second. Watching a film whose every beat you’ve already seen play out can just never be as satisfying as being engaged in a story that you are watching unfold for the first time. So, the experience is somewhat doomed from the start. But, if Hollywood remakes of foreign films continue to be handled with this much skill and respect, then I can’t really find all that much to complain about. Yeah, yeah, there are no new ideas in the movie industry and all that jazz; but when breaking things down into basic story elements the argument can be made that there have been no new ideas for centuries; so how far do you want to take this line of thinking? Next up is David Fincher’s remake of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, another English language remake that was put into production before the original was even out of US theaters. And another film that I’m sure will be constructed with the utmost care. Will I see it? Sure. Will I be excited to do so? Probably not very. And if it’s announced a couple weeks from now that Martin Scorcese is working on an English remake of Un prophète I’ll have the same reaction to that. If these great foreign films keep getting remade by talented filmmakers I’ll continue to see what it is they do with the material.
But that doesn’t get all you people who won’t read subtitles off the hook.
But that doesn’t get all you people who won’t read subtitles off the hook.
